AMAZON: E-Commerce Giant Announces Two New Services

Amazon recently announced two new services, Quantum Ledger Database (QLDB) and Managed Blockchain in its press release on Nov 28 last year. The services utilize distributed ledgers and blockchain technology. Amazon’s new services will benefit the blockchain sector move closer to mass adoption.

Amazon had earlier published on its Twitter account about Quantum Ledger Database (QLDB) on November 28 last year. The e-commerce giant also shared its AWS re-Invent 2018 video on the new launch of QLDB.

According to Amazon’s official website, the Quantum Ledger Database (QLDB), is a fully managed ledger database that provides a transaction log, controlled by a central trusted authority.

Amazon QLDB tracks each application data change and maintains a verifiable and complete history of modifications over time. However, the e-commerce giant has stated that the service currently provides an append only, an immutable, transparent, and highly verifiable journal.

Also, the QLDB service uses the SHA-256 cryptographic hash function.

Amazon classifies scalability, transparency, speed and ease of use as key features of QLDB and also highlights that the database can perform two to three times more transactions compared to current blockchain offerings.

Amazon has confirmed Healthdirect Australia as a customer for the QLDB. Bruce Haefele, the General Manager at Healthdirect Australia, stated on Amazon’s website that

“Healthdirect Australia operates in a heavily regulated industry, and it is critical that our compliance data is correct and auditable. With Amazon QLDB we look forward to having a complete and verifiable history of every change in our system, making it simple to audit when and how we arrived at our current state.”

Amazon also expects the service to be utilized by executives in Finance, Retail, Manufacturing, Insurance, Supply Chain, HR and Payroll.

In addition to QLDB, the e-commerce giant also launched theAWS Managed Blockchain and the blockchain service which supports both Ethereum and Hyperledger Fabric. It aims to make it accessible for businesses to create and manage scalable blockchain networks by using its two popular open source frameworks.

Andy Jassy, CEO of AWS recently stated in re-Invent 2018 that “This service is going to make it much easier for you to use the two most popular blockchain frameworks. When we heard people saying ‘blockchain,’ we felt like there was their weird convoluting and conflating what they really wanted, and as we spent time working with customers and figuring out the jobs they were really trying to solve, this is what we think people are trying to do with blockchain.”

Amazon’s progress to integrate blockchain technology into its core operations has led to speculation that the company may be edging closer to incorporate cryptocurrency payments.

This belief began to gain traction when it was revealed that the company purchased three cryptocurrency domains last year, Amazon acquired AmazonCryptocurrency.com, AmazonEthereum.com, and AmazonCryptocurrencies.com in 2017.

Will Amazon enter the crypto market with its own coin, considering the launch of QLDB and Managed Blockchain?Share your thoughts in the comments.